Saudi Arabia's oil giant Aramco has attracted total bids of US$44.3 billion for its initial public offering-or 1.7 times the money the Kingdom hopes to raise with the world's largest listing ever.
According to one of the IPO's lead managers, Samba Capital, quoted by Bloomberg, the IPO has attracted a total of 166 billion Saudi riyals as of Friday, after the subscription period for retail investors ended on Thursday, and less than a week before the end of the subscription period for institutional investors.
Saudi Arabia will be offering up to 0.5 percent in Aramco to retail investors, while in total the Kingdom plans to list 1.5 percent of the company on the Saudi stock exchange, the Tadawul.
Aramco has set an indicative price range of 30-32 Saudi riyals, (US$8-8.52), per share, in its long-awaited initial public offering, which would give the company a total value of some US$1.7 trillion. Saudi Arabia aims to raise more than US$25 billion from selling 1.5 percent in its crown jewel.
Over the past week, Aramco's IPO has drawn more bids than in the period to November 21, when the orders were nearly US$20 billion.
The Kingdom has doubled the leverage limits for loans that banks will extend to domestic retail investors who want to buy shares, looking to ensure that more retail customers will buy shares.
The retail portion of the IPO has already been oversubscribed, Samba Capital said on Thursday, when the retail subscription period expired.
The institutional subscription periods ends on December 4, and Aramco will announce the final offer price of the IPO on December 5.
Seeing that foreign institutional investors are not rushing to buy shares, Saudi Arabia is said to be tapping friendly governments in the Persian Gulf region to ensure the success of the IPO. Kuwait and Abu Dhabi may invest US$1 billion and US$1.5 billion in Aramco's offering, respectively.
By Tsvetana Paraskova for Oilprice.com
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Comments
I believe everyone following the news on Saudi Aramco is more excited to see the numbers of the foreign institutional shares.